


Unlike Father

by Oakwyrm



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Arthur Pendragon Lives (Merlin), Complicated Relationships, F/M, Family Feels, Good Morgana (Merlin), Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Introspection, Kilgharrah Shuts The Fuck Up So We Can All Be Happy (implied), off-screen childbirth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-07
Updated: 2020-07-07
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:47:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25108708
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Oakwyrm/pseuds/Oakwyrm
Summary: Arthur Pendragon, Once and Future King of Camelot, rules his lands in peace. Magic has returned and the people no longer live in fear of a tyrant who would sooner condemn them all to burn than listen to pleas of innocence, no matter how ardent or true.The momentous occasion of the new Prince's birth is cause for celebration. For to the people of Camelot, it speaks of more years of peace and prosperity to come. A secure future for their land. For the High King, it is a moment of great joy but it comes with the breaking of a wall he thought he had built to last and reflections he has spent his entire life running from.
Relationships: Gwen/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 25





	Unlike Father

**Author's Note:**

> In light of my remastering of an old fic I was suddenly possessed with the mighty need to write a quick "AU where everything didn't go to shit, people are happy, and Arthur gets to meet his son" thing. So here's that.

“You may come in now, your Majesty.”

The voice of the midwife halted the High King’s worried pacing outside of the Queen’s chambers in an instant. She had barely finished speaking before he moved. Without so much as a second glance to those around him he rushed past the door, into a room so seldom used it looked less like a Queen’s bed chamber and more like the sparse extra room one might as a last resort place a visiting noble in when none of the finer ones could be spared. The Queen lay in her bed, tired but well, having just brought their first child into the world.

Guinevere looked up, her hair messy and sweat-damp against her forehead, but with the brightest smile Arthur had ever seen on her face. In her arms rested a babe swaddled in a cloth of Camelot red and for all that he had spent half a day and night pacing outside of her door, Arthur found himself suddenly rooted to the spot.

Guinevere must have seen his hesitance for she smiled warmly and with a tired laugh said, “Come meet your son.”

Son.

The word echoed through his head as he stepped forward to sit at her bedside. The newborn Prince of Camelot lay contentedly in his mother’s arms, ignorant of how his father’s world had suddenly gone quiet, the blood rushing in his ears the only sound he was aware of.

“He’s beautiful,” Arthur finally managed to force out past the tangle of feelings suddenly perched in his chest, teetering on the edge of something dangerous which he could not name.

“Probably because he looks like Gwen,” Merlin’s cheerful voice piped up behind him. The bubble of tension within him burst and vanished in an instant.

“Merlin!” Despite his annoyance, there was laughter in his voice as his Court Sorcerer grinned at him, expression filled with fond teasing.

“No, Merlin’s right,” Morgana said as she gazed down at her new nephew, a look on her face which already told Arthur his son would be able to get away with absolutely anything under Morgana’s watch.

“Have you thought of a name?” Elyan asked. Guinevere and Arthur shared a look.

“Neither of us wanted to name our child for ourselves,” she began. “And obviously Uther is out of the question.”

“Obviously,” Morgana echoed, a brief flash of disgust crossing her face.

“We considered naming him, if he was a he, after dad.” Guinevere looked up at Elyan, who closed his eyes briefly and took a sharp breath.

“Unfortunately,” Arthur said, bitterness edging into his voice. “The Council and most of the court would not approve of the heir to Camelot’s throne being named for a blacksmith, whether he was the Queen’s father or no and they dislike Guinevere for the station of her birth enough as is.”

“Right.” Elyan nodded. “I understand. Don’t do anything to make things harder for her.”

“Which is why,” Guinevere continued, a rare spark of mischief lighting in her eye. “If it’s alright with you we would like to name him Elyan.”

Morgana’s sudden and delighted laughter could be heard well out into the corridor.

* * *

The first week of the Prince’s life passed quietly. Guinevere recovered beautifully, though she was still a little weak, and Elyan’s introduction to the people had gone off without a hitch. It was evening, as beautiful as one could ask with the sunset bathing the earth in golden hues and setting the sky ablaze.

Arthur sat quietly gazing down at his son, sleeping contentedly in his arms. This young life that so instinctively trusted him. Trusted that he was safe and protected in his father’s arms. And Arthur wondered, quietly to himself, if Uther had ever sat where he did now, gazing down at Arthur as a babe and wondering how anyone could have such blind faith in another person.

Instinctively he knew that had never happened. He had likely spent the first few months, maybe even the first full year, of his life entirely without his father’s company, Uther too bent on his mad, hypocritical quest to rid the land of all magic. No, Uther Pendragon had never sat and held his infant son in quiet contemplation as the sun set outside Camelot’s walls.

Arthur gazed down at his son and tried to imagine himself taking Elyan by the shoulder before every tournament, when he would already be awash with nerves, and telling him in a quiet voice so none around them would hear not to disappoint him. He tried to imagine himself shutting this boy in the dungeons for the simple crime of _disagreeing_ with him and taking matters into his own hands over something he thought unjust or unreasonable. Tried to imagine telling Elyan that he was proud of him while both of them knew that pride was secured by the flimsiest of threads.

He tried to imagine letting his son grow up doubting his father loved him. Scrambling desperately to please him, to catch his attention and prove himself _worthy_ of being loved by someone who should love him regardless.

The very thought made his stomach turn.

It had been a hard thing to learn to see his own father without the idealized view of youth and the desperate need to please the only parent he had ever known. But he had learned to see Uther’s hatred. His hypocrisy. The mad tyrant, that was what the people of Camelot now called him. Arthur could not blame them.

He had never allowed those thoughts to stray to what his father had thought of him. It had been an ever-present worry for as long as he could remember, but even as the rest of the image he had built up of his father began to crumble, he had never dared to touch this aspect. Too afraid of what he may find if he delved deeper.

It was a strange line to walk, this space between loving someone and despising them. Arthur had loved his father, idolized him, for longer than he could remember. And he had hated him, he had resented him, spent quiet nights cursing into his pillow where no one could hear him.

He had never railed against Uther to the extent that Morgana had, but he had done his fair share of arguing regardless. And he had wept, when he was younger. Only in the privacy of his own rooms where no one might hear him and think their Prince was falling apart simply because his father would not pay him mind.

But there had been light there, also. There had been laughter and learning and security. Uther had taught him how to hunt personally, rather than leave the task to one of his knights. He had sat with Arthur in the evenings when Arthur was just learning how to read and taught him how to spell his name. He had told stories of Camelot’s history and Uther’s campaign against magic. While Arthur knew now that those tales had been heavily skewed and biased to the extreme the memory still held the gentle glowing warmth of an ember in the hearth.

He had not told Arthur anything of Ygraine, and Arthur had quickly learned not to ask.

His relationship with his father had, and always would be, a mess of confusion and contradiction. It was too much to sort through cleanly. There was no way to make it make sense because it _didn’t_. So he had walled it up inside his mind. Separated Uther, his father, from Uther King of Camelot. A clean split where he could safely hate one and never have to think of the other.

It had taken only one look at his own son for the walls he had painstakingly built over the years to crumble to dust.

Arthur laid Elyan down in his cradle. The child of the maidservant who now stood beside him as Queen. He knew quite well _exactly_ what his father thought of that. Uther would have hated this child, Arthur’s son, his own grandson. For the simple fact that he was also Guinevere’s, that Arthur had chosen to marry for love rather than politics and tradition. He would have despised him.

“I don’t know which is worse,” he said, his voice strained against the emotion rising within him. Guinevere blinked and turned to him, a confused frown on her face at his jumping into a conversation he had previously been holding in his head. “The idea that he never truly loved me or that he did and still acted as he did.”

“Arthur?” she asked. “Are you alright?”

“I’ve been thinking,” he said as he reached down into the cradle to stroke Elyan’s cheek. “About my father.”

“Oh.” Guinevere shut the book she had been reading and set it aside, rising from where she had sat curled up in one of the chairs by the fireplace.

“I don’t think this is what you want to hear,” she said quietly, as she wrapped her arms around him, her head resting against his shoulder. “But I think he did. I’m not claiming he was perfect, or even a good father at all, but I believe he did truly love you.”

She paused for a moment to consider her words, then continued, “I think love gets too much credit. It is not an action, it’s a feeling and no feeling is more or less pure than any other. You can love someone, deeply and truly, and still hurt them terribly.”

Her arms tightened around Arthur as she spoke. He took a deep breath.

“You’re right, that’s not what I wanted to hear,” he said quietly. “But I think you’re right, which scares me more than I’d like to admit.”

“Scares you?” She pulled away just enough to frown at him. “Why should that scare you?”

“Because…” Arthur hesitated. “Because if he did love me, then what is there to stop me from treating Elyan as he treated me?”

Guinevere’s face softened into a look of such sorrow and deep affection that it nearly knocked him off his feet. She leaned up ever so slightly to press a soft, achingly sweet kiss to his lips.

“Because you are one hundred times the man your father was, Arthur Pendragon,” she said softly. “And if that does not reassure you then know that if you _do_ treat my son as Uther treated you, I will hold you accountable. And I will have three sorcerers, at least six knights, and your court physician standing by me.”

Arthur’s laugh was weak but real, as rested his forehead against hers.

“You counted Mordred twice there, I think.”

Guinevere laughed, more a quick breath. “I don’t think he’ll mind, do you?”

“Probably not,” Arthur conceded.

There was a pause as they stood together, arms about each other in a gentle embrace next to their son’s cradle. Guinevere kissed him once more and took his hands, pulling him a few steps away from where Elyan slept, peaceful and oblivious to the world around him.

“It’s getting late,” she said. “And we both need sleep.”

He let her lead him out of the nursery and back to their chambers without protest. In name they were his, she had her own elsewhere as was befitting any noble lady, but she hardly ever spent the night there. It was one of the peculiarities brought on by her low birth and their honest affection for one another which raised some eyebrows among the nobility. The easy intimacy and comfort of sharing his bed with his wife just to sleep was not something he had been raised to expect, but he found now that he had it that it was one of life’s simplest yet most fulfilling pleasures.

Guinevere’s maid, used to their peculiar sleeping arrangement after years of service, was already waiting to help her mistress out of the complex array of lace and silk that was her typical courtly dress.

They stepped behind the changing screen, and Arthur settled himself in his chair, waiting for the familiar ‘Thank you, Hellenna, I can manage from here’. It came almost sooner than expected. The maid curtsied as she excused herself, hurrying out with a basket of laundry under her arm.

Guinevere reappeared from behind the changing screen in her nightgown, and Arthur stepped behind it.

Having considerably less complicated clothing than her, he had no need of a manservant to help him undress. Indeed he had not employed a proper manservant since Merlin’s rise to the position of Court Sorcerer. Guinevere’s maid brought them both breakfast. A squire could always be found to outfit him with his armour and keep it polished and intact. His stable-hand cared for and cleaned up after his horses. The castle cleaning staff kept the chambers tidy. If he needed such courtly attire which he really could not get in or out of himself, there was always someone who could be found to help him.

It means a little more work spread across a few more people, but it did the job, and he found that he could not imagine replacing Merlin. After his easy insolence and teasing the respect and deference any replacement would show him just felt wrong.

“What are you thinking about so hard over here?” Guinevere’s voice called, startling him out of his thoughts and hurrying him in pulling on his nightclothes.

“Merlin,” he answered. “He’s ruined the concept of a manservant for me.”

Guinevere’s laugh rang from their bed, honest and amused. “How terrible for you.”

“You-” Arthur said as he stepped out from behind the changing screen “-have no respect for the hardships I go through.”

“No, no I do,” she said, though she still looked far too amused for him to take her seriously.

“Morgana’s a terrible influence on you, have I ever told you that?” he asked as he climbed into bed beside her. She rolled over to curl up closer to him, one hand coming to settle on his chest.

“Last time you said it was Merlin,” she said. He rolled his eyes.

“Both of them, then. Clearly, I am beset by enemies on all sides.”

She laughed again and leaned over to kiss him. “Goodnight, Arthur,” she said, with a light-hearted finality and he settled more comfortably beside her.

“Goodnight, my love.”

They lay there in silence, basking in the quiet calm as they waited for sleep to come and take them. Guinevere relaxed against him, breathing even, her head resting against his chest. As she began to drift off he spoke again, his voice soft in the quiet stillness, a near unheard ‘thank you’ before she slipped away into a restful night’s sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> Am I projecting? Maybe a little.


End file.
